Like adder darting from his coil,

Like wolf that dashes through the toil,
Like mountain-cat who guards her young,
Full at Fitz-James's throat he sprung,
Received, but recked not of a wound,
And locked his arms his foeman round.-
Now, gallant Saxon, hold thine own!
No maiden's hand is round thee thrown!
That desperate grasp thy frame might feel,
Through bars of brass and triple steel !—
They tug, they strain! down, down they go,
The Gael above, Fitz-James below.

The Chieftain's gripe his throat compressed,
His knee was planted in his breast;
His clotted locks he backward threw,
Across his brow his hand he drew,
From blood and mist to clear his sight,
Then gleamed aloft his dagger bright!-
-But hate and fury ill supplied
The stream of life's exhausted tide,
And all too late the advantage came,
To turn the odds of deadly game;
For, while the dagger gleamed on high,
Reeled soul and sense, reeled brain and eye.
Down came the blow! but in the heath
The erring blade found bloodless sheath.
The struggling foe may now unclasp
The fainting Chief's relaxing grasp;
Unwounded from the dreadful close,
But breathless all, Fitz-James arose.

SOUTHEY

(OUTLINE HISTORY, § 92)

THE SCHOLAR

My days among the Dead are past;
Around me I behold,

Where'er these casual eyes are cast,

The mighty minds of old;

My never failing friends are they,
With whom I converse day by day.

With them I take delight in weal

And seek relief in woe;

And while I understand and feel
How much to them I owe,

My cheeks have often been bedew'd
With tears of thoughtful gratitude.

My thoughts are with the Dead; with them
I live in long-past years,

Their virtues love, their faults condemn,
Partake their hopes and fears,

And from their lessons seek and find
Instruction with an humble mind.

My hopes are with the Dead; anon
My place with them will be,
And I with them shall travel on
Through all Futurity;

Yet leaving here a name, I trust,
That will not perish in the dust.

LANDOR

(OUTLINE HISTORY, §§ 92, 101)

ROSE AYLMER

AH what avails the sceptred race,
Ah what the form divine !
What every virtue, every grace !
Rose Aylmer, all were thine.
Rose Aylmer, whom these wakeful eyes
May weep, but never see,

A night of memories and of sighs
I consecrate to thee.

ON HIMSELF

I STROVE With none, for none was worth my strife;
Nature I lov'd, and next to Nature, Art;

I warm'd both hands before the fire of life;
It sinks, and I am ready to depart.

FRIENDSHIP

(From Imaginary Conversations: Barrow and Newton.) Newton. I had something more, sir, to say—or rather— I had something more, sir, to ask-about Friendship.

Barrow. All men, but the studious above all, must beware in the formation of it. Advice or caution on this subject comes immaturely and ungracefully from the young, exhibiting a proof either of temerity or suspicion; but when you hear it from a man of my age, who has been singularly fortunate in the past, and foresees the same felicity in those springing up before him, you may accept it as the direction of a calm observer, telling you all he has remarked on the greater part of a road which he has nearly gone through, and which you have but just entered. Never take into your confidence, or admit often into your company, any man who does not know, on some important subject, more than you do. Be his rank, be his virtues, what they may, he will be a hindrance to your pursuits, and an obstruction to your greatness. If indeed the greatness were such as courts can bestow, and such as can be laid on the shoulders of a groom and make him look like the rest of the company, my advice would be misplaced; but since all transcendent, all true and genuine greatness, must be of a man's own raising, and only on the foundation that the hand of God has laid, do not let any touch it: keep them off civilly, but keep them off. Affect no stoicism, display no indifference; let their coin pass current; but do not you exchange it for the purer one you carry, nor think the milling pays for the alloy. Greatly favoured and blessed by Providence will you be, if you should in your lifetime be known for what you are: the contrary, if you should be transformed.

Newton. Better and more decorous would it be, perhaps, if I filled up your pause with my reflections; but you always have permitted me to ask you questions; and now, unless my gratitude misleads me, you invite it.

Barrow. Ask me anything: I will answer it, if I can; and I will pardon you, as I have often done, if you puzzle me. Newton. Is it not a difficult and a painful thing to repulse, or to receive ungraciously, the advances of friendship?

Barrow. It withers the heart, if indeed his heart were ever sound that doth it. Love, serve, run into danger, venture life, for him who would cherish you: give him everything but your time and your glory. Morning recreations, convivial meals, evening walks, thoughts, questions, wishes, wants, partake with him. Yes, Isaac ! there are men born for friendship; men to whom the cultivation of it is nature, is necessity, as the making of honey is to bees. Do not let them suffer for the sweets they would gather; but do not think to live upon those sweets. Our corrupted state requires robuster food, or must grow more and more unsound.

CAMPBELL

(OUTLINE HISTORY, § 92)

DISTANCE LENDS ENCHANTMENT'
(From The Pleasures of Hope, Part I.)

Ar summer eve, when Heaven's ethereal bow
Spans with bright arch the glittering hills below,
Why to yon mountain turns the musing eye,
Whose sunbright summit mingles with the sky?
Why do those cliffs of shadowy tint appear

More sweet than all the landscape smiling near ?—
'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view,
And robes the mountain in its azure hue.
Thus, with delight, we linger to survey
The promised joys of life's unmeasured way;

Thus, from afar, each dim-discover'd scene
More pleasing seems than all the past hath been.
And every form, that Fancy can repair

From dark oblivion, glows divinely there.

THE BATTLE OF THE BALTIC

I.

OF Nelson and the North,

Sing the glorious day's renown,

When to battle fierce came forth

All the might of Denmark's crown,

And her arms along the deep proudly shone;

By each gun the lighted brand,

In a bold determined hand,

And the Prince of all the land

Led them on.

II.

Like leviathans afloat,

Lay their bulwarks on the brine;
While the sign of battle flew

On the lofty British line:

It was ten of April morn by the chime
As they drifted on their path,

There was silence deep as death;

And the boldest held his breath,
For a time.—

III.

But the might of England flush'd
To anticipate the scene;

And her van the fleeter rush'd

O'er the deadly space between.

'Hearts of oak!' our captains cried; when

each gun

From its adamantine lips

Spread a death-shade round the ships,

Like the hurricane eclipse

Of the sun.